Serigraphy is the making of silkscreen prints. A piece of silk, nylon, monofilament polyester, multifilament polyester, organdy, or other suitable material is stretched over a frame. The material has open mesh and mesh blocked in selected areas and thus acts as a screen or stencil, the unblocked areas for allowing ink to pass through the fabric on the underlying surface to be printed. Ink or other pigment carrying medium is typically poured over the screen and then scrapped, with a squeegee or the like over the fabric. This forces the ink or pigment through the unblocked mesh to transfer the ink or pigment to the fabric in a pattern reflecting the silkscreen pattern.
Applicants provide, however, a silkscreen, including fabric and emulsion, that will not react with or be damaged by the presence of an oxidizer, such as bleach, as well as a gel bleach composition of suitable viscosity such that it will pass through the open pores of the silkscreen and not run or migrate horizontally in the fabric yet to be blocked by the nonporous regions of the silkscreen. Thus, applicants provide a method and composition suitable to decorate a dyed fabric, such as indigo dyed cotton denim, by dye removal.